> All scientific fields have testable, unifying theories

Correlation isn't causation, the unifying theory isn't what makes the field scientific.

Are you saying that Kahneman, or Milgram, aren't scientists? Since they used the scientific method, that makes them scientists in my book. What's your objection?

> Truth cannot be falsified -- that is not how truth is logically defined. A tentative truth is not a truth. A potentially falsifiable truth is not a truth (that's a theory).

That is correct. I never said that a theory is truth, or that truth is a theory. Theories are what we speculate the truth to be, until we are proven wrong. I don't know how anyone can be arguing against this, it seems very fundamentally obvious to me.

> That is not something I seem to think, that is a fact.

No, it's not a fact. A theory has as much to do with the truth as a map has to do with the actual territory. Saying that maps have nothing to do with the territories they try to describe is ridiculous. The fact that your map may be inaccurate doesn't mean the territory doesn't exist.

> So you see, I didn't invent this definition -- it is one on which scientists agree, even those who oppose science on philosophical grounds.

And I agree with it too. That definition is in no way at odds with what I'm saying.

> Misquotations don't arise from misunderstandings

I didn't quote you.

> But to a scientist, astrology is not astronomy because it has a different theory.

> > I completely disagree. They can have two, three, or a hundred theories like that, and still be a science.

> You just declared astrology a science. Congratulations.

How does that even follow? I declared astrology a science because I said it doesn't need a unified theory? You're denying the antecedent:

A science doesn't have to have a unifying theory to be a science. Astrology doesn't have a unifying theory. Therefore, astrology is a science.

> By your reasoning, astrology is part of astronomy, differing in only a few theoretical details.

"By your reasoning, chemistry is part of physics, differing in only a few theoretical details." What it's called and whether it's a science are two different things.

> But to a scientist, astrology is not astronomy because it has a different theory.

Astrology isn't astronomy mainly because astrology is not a science, since it doesn't care about testing its claims.

> Do you know why physics is accepted as a science? It's because all practitioners of physics, from theoreticians to engineers who build bridges, all agree on the single theory that defines what they do, and that defines physics and distinguishes it from other scientific fields as well as unscientific fields.

So how is it possible for both physics and chemistry to be sciences? If you can have many unifying theories, then this just becomes an issue of labels, and I'm explicitly not discussing labels, but whether or not you need a single theory in order to be scientific.

Physics and chemistry don't have a single unifying theory, yet they're both sciences. That's because a unifying theory is not what defines science. It may be what defines a field, which is why physics and chemistry are different, but a science is defined by following the scientific method, i.e. a search for truth.

EDIT: Goddamnit, this must be the longest argument between two people who agree ever written. I can't believe we can't even communicate something this simple efficiently. I don't think we've disagreed on a single thing all this time.